


Snakes And Dogs Don’t Mix

by fractalgeometry



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Dogs, Gen, Happy Ending, Hurt/Comfort, Light Angst, Scared Crowley (Good Omens), Snake Crowley (Good Omens)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-10
Updated: 2020-07-10
Packaged: 2021-03-05 05:54:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,206
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25189810
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fractalgeometry/pseuds/fractalgeometry
Summary: Crowley was having a lovely day out at the park, slithering around in snake form and scaring people, taking naps, and generally making a nuisance of himself. Then the Beast arrived, and Crowley’s day took a significant turn for the worse.~Or: Crowley learns the hard way that dogs like to play with things that move. This is not a fun experience.
Relationships: Aziraphale & Crowley (Good Omens)
Comments: 6
Kudos: 87





	Snakes And Dogs Don’t Mix

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Man's (and Demon's and Angel's) Best Friend](https://archiveofourown.org/works/25153165) by [AnonymousDandelion](https://archiveofourown.org/users/AnonymousDandelion/pseuds/AnonymousDandelion). 



> This is an expansion on a conversation in chapter 2 of Man’s (and Demon’s, and Angel’s) Best Friend by AnonymousDandelion, in which Aziraphale and Crowley discuss dogs and Crowley’s feelings toward them. It is _strongly_ implied that Crowley has had unpleasant run-ins with dogs before, so I wrote this as an example of what that might have looked like.
> 
> This definitely stands alone and can be read regardless of whether you’ve read AnonymousDandelion’s story, though I definitely recommend reading theirs anyway because it’s awesome!

Crowley was having a good day. He had started feeling rather snakey that morning, and by eleven-thirty was having a good slither through the park. Demonic work could be done just as well as a snake, depending on what demonic work he was intending to do, and since he didn’t have a solid plan for the day anyway, it didn’t matter. Scaring a few people into thinking he was venomous was a good start, and if he wanted to nap on a sunny rock in between, that was his own business. Sloth was one of the seven deadly sins, after all. Very demonic.

He had just woken up from this nap when he saw the animal. It was huge, and furry, and looming a mere four or five feet away from him. It had huge teeth, and a giant tongue, and- _oh._ It was a dog. Crowley had, in his sleep-addled state, somewhat forgotten that he was currently a snake, and not a very large one at that. Knowing from experience that getting animal control called on you was more trouble than it was worth, Crowley had chosen a relatively small form that morning, perhaps two and a half feet long. Big enough to scare, small enough to hide in the underbrush. 

This was metaphorically — and perhaps literally — coming back to bite him now. The dog, he saw, was advancing, tongue hanging out, teeth on full display, and Crowley was _cornered._ He had experienced dogs in snake form before, but they had always been Hellhounds, and he took great pains not to be cornered by them. Right now, he was wishing he’d thought to take the same precautions against regular, earthly hounds. 

The dog was standing over him. Crowley weighed his options, then tried to slither between its paws. He was fast, but apparently dogs were faster. Something pinned him to the ground. It was, he realized, a dog paw. This was quickly getting out of hand.

Crowley could escape, of course, but there were humans around, and changing size or form without warning would likely draw a lot more attention than he wanted to deal with at the moment. So he tried to make himself as skinny as possible to slide out from under the paw.

The dog batted at his tail with the other paw. It hurt significantly more than it seemed like it should. If Crowley were human-styled, he would have grimaced. He curled his tail around the paw holding him down and tried to pry it off.

The dog abruptly stopped pinning him down, raising the paw that had been on Crowley’s back and looking at it excitedly. Crowley, whose tail was still curled around said paw, was unceremoniously yanked along, dangling in the air like nothing more than a scrap of string. He hissed in discomfort and anger.

This only seemed to excite the dog, who barked and put its paw back down. Crowley quickly uncurled and tried to flee again. At his movement, the dog batted at him again, paw connecting with much more force than it seemed like should be packed into that movement. Crowley hissed again, curling in on himself, trying to seem small and uninteresting. 

The paw connected with his side one more time, accompanied by excited barking. Then he heard a human voice coming closer.

“Magnus! What are you doing? Oh my god, it’s a snake! Not a toy, Magnus! Come here!”

The dog barked again. Crowley lifted his head from his coils to see a pair of feet next to the paws. The human grabbed the dog’s collar and started dragging it away. As soon as there was a clear path out of the corner, Crowley shot across the ground, moving as fast as a snake-demon could go (which was _very_ fast; there’s a lot to run away from in Hell) until he reached a clump of bushes. He coiled himself around a branch and stayed there, hissing menacingly when a beetle tried to climb nearby.

The beetle, being much smarter than a dog, wisely decided to avoid him. 

Crowley stayed in the bushes for a while, weighing his options. He was very done with being a snake at this point, but changing back was likely to draw unwanted attention unless he did it very carefully. Increasing his size to a less dog-friendly one would undoubtedly attract even more attention, and he was really not in the mood for attention. 

Finally he uncoiled from the branch and moved to a space that was large enough to change back. Attention or no, he was _not_ willing to risk another run-in with an animal that lacked a proper fear of demonic snakes. 

Resisting the urge to wiggle his fingers and toes in appreciation of having them back, he stepped out of the bushes as though it were perfectly normal and adopted his best do-not-cross-me walk to get him back to the Bentley. Once he was inside, he sat still for eight minutes and nine seconds, carefully not looking at any of the dogs that walked past, and equally carefully assuring himself that he was fine. Then he laid his hands on the steering wheel and kicked the car into drive.

Halfway home he made an abrupt decision and an equally abrupt turn, and a few minutes later pulled up in front of Aziraphale’s bookshop. Scooping up the bottle of wine that had recently discovered itself on the passenger seat, he went inside, bell ringing merrily as the door closed. 

“Hey, Aziraphale,” he called. “What’re you up to?”

“Hello, Crowley!” Aziraphale called from the back room. “Come on back!”

Crowley did, finding Aziraphale reading, which he really should have guessed in the first place. “Want to get drunk?” he asked, holding up the bottle.

Aziraphale looked up at him, frowning through his reading glasses. “Is everything all right?”

“Sure,” Crowley said easily. “Just thought I’d pop by and see if you were around.”

Aziraphale looked at him for a moment, and if Crowley hadn’t known that no one could see through his armor when it was in full force, he’d have thought Aziraphale was right now. He chose not to think about the fact that if there was an exception to “no one”, it would be Aziraphale. That was not what he was here for, thank you very much.

“A drink sounds lovely,” Aziraphale said after a moment. 

~

A drink turned into two, then three, then more, as it was wont to do. Crowley sprawled deeper on the sofa, enjoying the feeling of being large, and free, and far away from unpleasant creatures such as dogs. Aziraphale was rambling on about something or other, and Crowley let that voice wash over him, coming and going in waves, reminding him that he wasn’t a snake, and he wasn’t alone, and he was in control. It was good. 

He took another drink. “Nice night,” he said, which was almost definitely a non-sequitur, but he didn’t care.

Aziraphale, who, while drunk, was purposely not nearly as drunk as Crowley, stopped talking and smiled. “It is,” he agreed. 

Crowley grinned. “Glad you weren’t busy.”

Then he slid another few inches down into the sofa and sank into the feeling of being safe.

**Author's Note:**

> Since this is set during canon, I was originally going to have it just be about Crowley, but I couldn’t quite leave him alone and stressed about being attacked by a dog, so we got a bit of Aziraphale at the end. I hope you liked it! Comments are one of my favorite things, if you have any thoughts.

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [A Dinner Date Gone Wrong (or: Getting Animal Control Called On You Is More Trouble Than It's Worth)](https://archiveofourown.org/works/25191886) by [AnonymousDandelion](https://archiveofourown.org/users/AnonymousDandelion/pseuds/AnonymousDandelion)




End file.
